Most helpful positive review

First some background(skip to third paragraph if you don't want it):Since June or so of this year I've been working at getting in shape, slowly adding in new exercises that work. I tried P90X, but I was too out of shape for it at the beginning. So, I worked with a trainer for a 2 months or so and then I started cycling and then I started stand up paddle surfing and also using a step machine that I have. So, my workouts have been cycling some days, surfing some days and step machine some days. When Kinect came out I bought it hoping that it would add another interesting workout into the mix, especially with winter coming and surfing and cycling getting harder in the cold. I bought a lot of games hoping for one or two games that would be fun enough to keep me moving and maybe even so fun that I pushed myself harder than I would have with just exercise for exercise sake. I bought sonic free riders, dance central, fighters uncaged, kinect adventures(came with the kinect), Your Shape Fitness Evolved and Kinectimals. Kinectimals has kind of been a bust for me. It really is a little kid's game. I thought it might have some impressive AI. Dance Central is great. It really recognizes your movements and corrects you. Sonic Free Riders has taken some time to get in to. Like MarioKart, you have to memorize the levels, but its tiring on your knees squating down and leaning forwards and backwards the whole time and then squatting and jumping over jumps and jump turning in the air to try to pull moves. So, I only do 5 or 6 runs a session and have not memorized the levels, which makes winning impossible. Your Shape Fitness Evolved is also very good. You have to do the moves in time with the trainer in the fitness classes, otherwise you don't get credit for them. The gym games are fun and I wish there were more of them and that there was some kind of fitness class that incorporated them. I have done 3 workouts with Your Shape since getting it, there's also a website that lets you track your progress which is really neat, especially for me because I've found that keeping a journal of my workouts has been really motivational and with this website, I get to see other people working at getting in shape too.

I was also what many would consider a "hardcore" gamer. I used to play Bond on N64 and MarioKart for marathon sessions in college. I played a lot of Oblivion in 2007 and assasin's creed and quake on the pc in 2008 -2009. I have loved most of the Zelda games and get really lost in them, including on Nintendo DS. So, I'm not a world of warcraft junkie or a caffeinated FPS lover and I don't play many sports games, but I have a fine appreciation for precision controls and became frustrated with Wii attempts at sports games that required you to waggle the controller (while I loved the Wii for its fun game play and for movement games that were precise like laser hockey). Kinect has been a really nice addition for me with my workouts and is not a Wii-type waggle motion control mechanism. It recognizes you and your movements accurately. Its not as precise as a mouse and keyboard, or even a handheld controller - but the games that its made for are not button pressing games. They are games that are designed to require to you to move your entire body and I've been really happy with the performance of the games and the motion detection.

So, knowing how I look at games, you can now hear what I think about this game. I like this game a lot. First, I was incredibly frustrated when the game would not recognize my moves, despite trying to mimic the onscreen avatar till my thighs were burning from jumping and squatting and from squatting and then exploding up through an uppercut. I sort of chalked this game up to a loss, but then I had a friend come over and saw that he was able to control it much better than I was. Together we went through the training classes analyzing how the kinect saw different movements and got to understand how this game wants you to control the player. This game does not require you to punch hard. You simply have to move your hand forward for a punch. This game does not require you to do a full body punch to get someone in the gut, instead starting with your hands in guard mode, you make a circle to the outside pointed diagonally downward. Also, moves are only possible from certain distances which are clearly marked at all times. So, you can't uppercut somebody from long range. And you can't round kick a knee from long range. You have to be up close. Once we worked this out, the game got a LOT better. The workouts that I went through getting to this point were hard - exactly what I wanted: I found myself forcing my body keep up with what my mind wanted it to do. Although my thighs were burning from squatting, I would push to try to get Kinect to see the movement.

I've just moved up the ladder to league 2 today. I've played this game maybe 5 or 6 times. Each time I walk away pretty sweaty and have to take a shower. Its been a really good addition to the workout routine. Especially good is that as you fight the computer, you have to dodge punches which means leaning back very quickly many times at unexpected times. So, you're using your stomach and lower back and keeping tight the whole time. My stomach and back were sore (in a good way) for the past few days and just are starting to feel ready for the game today. This game is a really, really good start on fighting games for kinect.

I've seen reviews that seem to be written by people who were in the frustrated stage of review that I was in before I really worked out how to control the game. I wish they would keep at it and really do the training until they can successfully pull off the moves there before they write these reviews. This is a quality game. Its worth buying. You have to work at getting it down - but that's like all sports. You have to practice and for the first time, video games are starting to feel like sports with the kinect. The more you train your movements, the better you will be at playing this game. And that's exactly what I was looking for when I bought it. So, I really love this game and encourage people to buy it.

Most helpful critical review

Very ambitious effort to take the fighting genre and seriously allow you full body control. The Kinect is strong enough to support this, however the game lacks any real depth. The game starts off with a pretty informative tutorial teaching you all the basics to have success on the streets. Once you begin fighting though, you are trying to earn crowns to advance to the next level. Each level requires so many crowns that you do not end up just fighting each person one time, you must fight them several times to level up. By the time you level up, you have fought one of the same 6 fighters multiple times. You do slowly unlock new fighters to fight, but only about 5 more. So here this game only offers maybe 11 or 12 adversaries, that slowly go up in difficulty when you collect enough crowns. Bottom line is you quickly understand how out of shape you are when you are trying to fight 3 or 4 opponents in row, only to realize that if you were in great shape you would have the game beat in perhaps two or three sessions of game play. There are better titles available for the Kinect (Kinect Sports!!!) but this is a needed step in the right direction. Imagine Marvel vs Capcom 3 supported by the Kinect.... the Kinect seems powerful enough, it would just take some time from the developers to make it pay off.

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First some background(skip to third paragraph if you don't want it):Since June or so of this year I've been working at getting in shape, slowly adding in new exercises that work. I tried P90X, but I was too out of shape for it at the beginning. So, I worked with a trainer for a 2 months or so and then I started cycling and then I started stand up paddle surfing and also using a step machine that I have. So, my workouts have been cycling some days, surfing some days and step machine some days. When Kinect came out I bought it hoping that it would add another interesting workout into the mix, especially with winter coming and surfing and cycling getting harder in the cold. I bought a lot of games hoping for one or two games that would be fun enough to keep me moving and maybe even so fun that I pushed myself harder than I would have with just exercise for exercise sake. I bought sonic free riders, dance central, fighters uncaged, kinect adventures(came with the kinect), Your Shape Fitness Evolved and Kinectimals. Kinectimals has kind of been a bust for me. It really is a little kid's game. I thought it might have some impressive AI. Dance Central is great. It really recognizes your movements and corrects you. Sonic Free Riders has taken some time to get in to. Like MarioKart, you have to memorize the levels, but its tiring on your knees squating down and leaning forwards and backwards the whole time and then squatting and jumping over jumps and jump turning in the air to try to pull moves. So, I only do 5 or 6 runs a session and have not memorized the levels, which makes winning impossible. Your Shape Fitness Evolved is also very good. You have to do the moves in time with the trainer in the fitness classes, otherwise you don't get credit for them. The gym games are fun and I wish there were more of them and that there was some kind of fitness class that incorporated them. I have done 3 workouts with Your Shape since getting it, there's also a website that lets you track your progress which is really neat, especially for me because I've found that keeping a journal of my workouts has been really motivational and with this website, I get to see other people working at getting in shape too.

I was also what many would consider a "hardcore" gamer. I used to play Bond on N64 and MarioKart for marathon sessions in college. I played a lot of Oblivion in 2007 and assasin's creed and quake on the pc in 2008 -2009. I have loved most of the Zelda games and get really lost in them, including on Nintendo DS. So, I'm not a world of warcraft junkie or a caffeinated FPS lover and I don't play many sports games, but I have a fine appreciation for precision controls and became frustrated with Wii attempts at sports games that required you to waggle the controller (while I loved the Wii for its fun game play and for movement games that were precise like laser hockey). Kinect has been a really nice addition for me with my workouts and is not a Wii-type waggle motion control mechanism. It recognizes you and your movements accurately. Its not as precise as a mouse and keyboard, or even a handheld controller - but the games that its made for are not button pressing games. They are games that are designed to require to you to move your entire body and I've been really happy with the performance of the games and the motion detection.

So, knowing how I look at games, you can now hear what I think about this game. I like this game a lot. First, I was incredibly frustrated when the game would not recognize my moves, despite trying to mimic the onscreen avatar till my thighs were burning from jumping and squatting and from squatting and then exploding up through an uppercut. I sort of chalked this game up to a loss, but then I had a friend come over and saw that he was able to control it much better than I was. Together we went through the training classes analyzing how the kinect saw different movements and got to understand how this game wants you to control the player. This game does not require you to punch hard. You simply have to move your hand forward for a punch. This game does not require you to do a full body punch to get someone in the gut, instead starting with your hands in guard mode, you make a circle to the outside pointed diagonally downward. Also, moves are only possible from certain distances which are clearly marked at all times. So, you can't uppercut somebody from long range. And you can't round kick a knee from long range. You have to be up close. Once we worked this out, the game got a LOT better. The workouts that I went through getting to this point were hard - exactly what I wanted: I found myself forcing my body keep up with what my mind wanted it to do. Although my thighs were burning from squatting, I would push to try to get Kinect to see the movement.

I've just moved up the ladder to league 2 today. I've played this game maybe 5 or 6 times. Each time I walk away pretty sweaty and have to take a shower. Its been a really good addition to the workout routine. Especially good is that as you fight the computer, you have to dodge punches which means leaning back very quickly many times at unexpected times. So, you're using your stomach and lower back and keeping tight the whole time. My stomach and back were sore (in a good way) for the past few days and just are starting to feel ready for the game today. This game is a really, really good start on fighting games for kinect.

I've seen reviews that seem to be written by people who were in the frustrated stage of review that I was in before I really worked out how to control the game. I wish they would keep at it and really do the training until they can successfully pull off the moves there before they write these reviews. This is a quality game. Its worth buying. You have to work at getting it down - but that's like all sports. You have to practice and for the first time, video games are starting to feel like sports with the kinect. The more you train your movements, the better you will be at playing this game. And that's exactly what I was looking for when I bought it. So, I really love this game and encourage people to buy it.

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Like some of the reviewers I was *extremely* frustrated with the game because I was expecting it to be realistic. So yeah yeah yeah enough with the instructions lets fight. And it was abysmal! I'd throw a punch and it would kick, I'd jab and it would throw an elbow, I'd throw a knee and it would round kick. I threw some new and innovative cuss words. I'm 47, started with martial arts when I was 11 or so, and was kickboxing the night before the first of 2 hip replacements (both hips) so yes my expectations were high. I was looking at it for a fun and fit way to enjoy the sport in my post-ring days.

Then I started paying attention to the game, what it wanted, how it moved, and begrudgingly I RTFM. (That's Read The F'ing Manual for non-techies). You have to stand with your feet parallel to the Kinect, not in a classic fighting stance. You punch with your arms, not your shoulders and hips. You need to move conservatively, if you throw a full round kick to the head it can also see your upper body (shoulders, head, arms) move which confuses it. And once I started playing the game the way it is intended to be played it actually IS fun, I work up a solid sweat and its vigorous enough to make my hips ache. :-) I'd definitely like to see a more realistic game, and I think that may be a limitation of the Kinect for the reasons I noted. Throw a jab with your shoulder and the shoulder triggers a hook punch for the avatar. Right foot forward and a left front kick pushes the hip, the hip triggers a round kick for the avatar. Not sure if that can be compensated for. Adjusting my play so that I stay within the limitations of the Kinect (or game, could be either) while keeping the fighting mindset of blocking, parrying, countering, and attacking openings has made it a pretty cool game. Which basically means its a pretty cool game.

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Very ambitious effort to take the fighting genre and seriously allow you full body control. The Kinect is strong enough to support this, however the game lacks any real depth. The game starts off with a pretty informative tutorial teaching you all the basics to have success on the streets. Once you begin fighting though, you are trying to earn crowns to advance to the next level. Each level requires so many crowns that you do not end up just fighting each person one time, you must fight them several times to level up. By the time you level up, you have fought one of the same 6 fighters multiple times. You do slowly unlock new fighters to fight, but only about 5 more. So here this game only offers maybe 11 or 12 adversaries, that slowly go up in difficulty when you collect enough crowns. Bottom line is you quickly understand how out of shape you are when you are trying to fight 3 or 4 opponents in row, only to realize that if you were in great shape you would have the game beat in perhaps two or three sessions of game play. There are better titles available for the Kinect (Kinect Sports!!!) but this is a needed step in the right direction. Imagine Marvel vs Capcom 3 supported by the Kinect.... the Kinect seems powerful enough, it would just take some time from the developers to make it pay off.

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First off I played this game over the weekend and loved it. My wife got a kick out of me finishing off an opponent then looking over my shoulder with a goofy "look what I did 10 year-old" grin. But I almost didn't buy this one because of the bad reviews. Fact is I did get it because I also read the good reviews and it seemed that the people who enjoyed it had two things in common one they learned how it worked, and two they didn't take themselves too seriously.Yes first learn how the "game" works, what moves it uses, and what it can and can't do. I, as some of the other reviewers, have been in the martial arts for years and this is actually not a good thing in regards to this game. Learning this game is like learning a new style old habits get in the way. Also the Kinect only sees in 2D so if you put one foot behind the other in your cool traditional stance the Kinect thinks you just lost a leg. Lastly on this point this game does not track all your killer fighting moves it only sees your movements as triggers for game movements. For it to tack everything you do would take a great deal higher level of tech than the Kinect and Xbox can muster, and a game that would do this would appeal to what? 10% or less of the population, not every gamer has had 10 to 20 years of training.Yes this game is fun, it will give you a good workout, and it will teach both beginners and "experts" how to control their movements.

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Having looked over the spread of Kinect games currently available I have begun to notice a trend. If an over-weight ADHD twelve-year-old can't play it properly, then it must be terrible, right? Right?Fighter's Uncaged presents precisely this dilemma, and its low scores across the board indicate that it is useless, if not entirely broken as many critics have claimed.

Having played through the whole tutorial and successfully combated all the introductory fighters (with a flawless record no less), I feel it is time to set the record straight. There are a number of points about this game that must be heeded in order for it to be in any way entertaining or useful.

1) Kids beware - it isn't that the game is that terribly challenging (come on critics, really?) but the movements required to perform maneuvers are precise. Thus, if you aren't precise and are prone to throwing your arms and legs out haphazardly trying to hit your opponent, you will be foiled. Thus, this game is simply not kid friendly as most kids (and over-weight critics) have a tendency to do just that - flail around to no avail.

2) It works... but do you? - I'm not in top condition by any means, but I am physically fit enough to know that out-of-shapers will simply be frustrated by this game. This game not only requires stamina but also precision, which if you are out of shape you simply will not have. The repeated whine from the critics has been "it doesn't work, wah*wah*wah". The reality is that it does work, just fine, but it doesn't work if you can't control your limbs enough to accurately perform the gestures. It's pretty much that simple: if you can't properly activate the Kinect with your movements, then it will have to try to guess what you are doing, and this can result in sporadic movements and lag. If, however, you properly learn the moves (on both sides of the body, which is necessary, not superfluous as the critic claims) and remember their motions accurately, then you will have no problem.

3) Fitness = Practice - This may come as a surprise to the gaming critic world, but if you want to continue reviewing Kinect games you are going to have to get in shape to do it. The fact is that games such as Fighters Uncaged require a minimum level of fitness in order for it to work correctly. Further, it seems that the expectation of many people, critics included, when appropriating this game is that it should play like Street Fighter or Mortal Combat, plug and play so to speak. The reality is that you have to be physically conditioned enough in order to actually perform the gestures necessary and have the reflexes necessary to keep up in combat. If you were actually going to become a professional fighter you wouldn't start by booking a fight, you would take time to prepare and train before booking your first fight. This game is no different. If you can't pass through the tutorials then you need to keep practicing until you can properly execute all the different techniques.

4) Is it for me? - For any of you out there that are worried by the overwhelming negative critic response to this game, so long as you take into account the above mentioned warnings, you should at least give it a try. If you are like me, you will find an entertaining game that after about two hours of training you can successfully plug away at and will in the process get a fantastic workout. The more you play (practice) the better you will get and the more fluid your motions will be.

Bottom Line: If you are 1) older youth to adult, 2) physically fit and wanting a challenge, and 3) at least moderately coordinated, then this game will be a great physical and mental challenge for you.

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This game is so awesome for a motion control video game. The bad reviews for the game are from people who think they should play it as real life. It's a video game and you have to give button combinations or "Motion Combinations" that he game understands! Once you realize this concept, this game is so awesome and fun. I am 28 years old and a life long gamer. This game presents the next level of combat gaming. It is a entry level game for this technology (1st generation) but it performs as advertised. When you get the movement combinations down, the kinect does recognize and excute will good accuracy. If you are a tall person 6ft+, you need to place the sensor at waist high and 6ft+ away. Keep your feet close to paralell and use the movements provided in the instruction booklet and the training sessions. It does work as advertised and it is fun game. Sometimes it does get to be a little much, but that is because YOU ARE THE CONTROLER. If you want to sit down, get a tradition game where you press buttons. Thanks and have fun getting off the couch and joining in the game itself.

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This is one of my top favorite games for kinect! It's just like kinect sports boxing but this time you can do all sorts of different kicks for damaging! I haven't seen any lag at all in this game and the motion tracking is extremely accurate as long as you are playing correctly. Make sure you definitely DO NOT skip the training before entering into real fights. The training tells you how far or close your character should be to his opponent to pull certain moves off. For example if your opponent is not standing close enough to your character, but ducking back .... there is no way you can of course do a head butt on him. Wait, until your opponent stands close to you to head butt him. This game by the way is definitely for teens + because of some of the language the fighters uses. What a awesome workout this game is, too. It REALLY gets your heart rate up.

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I think this game gets a bad rap because players go into it thinking the fighter is going to mimic their every move. Remember Street Fighter II? All the characters had moves, but to make those moves work you had to do certain button and joystick combinations. If you did the combination wrong, then nothing would happen. Fighters Uncaged reminds me of this concept. For example, an overhand punch is not done by performing an actual overhand punch. Instead you raise your fist up in the air and bring it back down. Kinect recognizes this move and - if you are within range of your opponent - makes your fighter perform the move. Notice I said "within range". There are three ranges - close, medium, and long. You cannot throw a roundhouse kick if you are in close range. If you do, nothing will happen. My son got very frustrated because he didn't have the patience to learn this concept (he skipped all the training).

Some moves are tough to master. I have trouble doing leg sweeps. The trick is to duck and step forward. To duck correctly, you should bend forward at the waist so that your shoulders come forward (you can't just bend your knees). Once that is done, you can hook punch to the body, stand up with an uppercut, or shoot the leg forward for a sweep. Again, the moves have to be timed with the range or nothing will happen. Think of yourself as a controller. Certain moves will trigger reactions in your fighter. He doesn't follow you like the Fitness games - he is separate from you.

The menus are hard to navigate. The icon jumps around and sticks, making it hard to select things. That is my main gripe. Otherwise I really enjoy the gameplay. I bought this more for doing light workouts rather than a gaming experience. Fitness Evolved is fine, but I like to change up the routine, and this keeps me moving in a very entertaining way.

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This is a good game fo you to try kinect. Read the brochure and see how you do the main moves and you're ready to go. Tutorial is too long, then you start fighting. Punching and kicking in a video game is really great, much better than any other fighting video game seen before.

I won't give it 5 stars because the game has only one mode. There are not mini-games to practice, it's a single player game, you can't edit your player, you can't create enemies...

I believe it was launched in a rush to go with kinect launch, but with a software update they can go far beyond. I expect they release an update

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I played this game three times. Once only because I had company and wanted to show them another Kinect game. It's hard to do most of the moves; or I should say that you feel like you're doing the right move, but the game doesn't recognize it. Often you can do the exact same movement and get different results. You can kick exactly the same way and get a low front kick or a kick to the head.

One of the weirdest things is the fact that the background story can only be found in the game manual. Seems very much like they rushed to get the game out on Kinect day 1. They got my money, unfortunately.